Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
When I put this motion together, I was hearing from constituents about the concerns they had when they were seeing countries like the United States and the United Kingdom having much better access to vaccines than we had here in Canada, but I had some faith in the Government of Canada and our bureaucrats to be negotiating the best agreement possible.
However, after listening to Mr. Powlowski's comments over the last few minutes, I am extremely concerned by the idea that now, all of a sudden, we're worried that antagonizing the vaccine manufacturers might jeopardize the delivery of vaccines. What kind of agreement did we sign if we have to worry that if we question what is in the agreement they can somehow arbitrarily cut us off if they don't like the tone of the opposition or the government?
Are there zero obligations in these contracts for the pharmaceutical companies to meet their contractual agreements? If there is somehow a bad tone from the Canadian House of Commons, can Pfizer or Johnson & Johnson or AstraZeneca or Moderna say they didn't like the tone and thank goodness they signed ridiculous contracts with the Government of Canada and can just withhold vaccines? That is incredibly short-sighted. If we indeed have these incredible agreements, these iron-clad agreements with these pharmaceutical companies, they should be open for scrutiny.
If my colleague is saying that if we antagonize them it could jeopardize the delivery of vaccines, I'm just thinking, holy smokes, what kind of agreements did we actually sign if a tweet or a Facebook post or an Instagram post is going to cause Johnson & Johnson to cut off our delivery of vaccines?
Now I am all the more ardent that this motion be supported by the committee, because I want to know what is in those agreements. Are there cash penalties? Are there obligations in terms of meeting the agreement on the quotas that the Government of Canada has reached with these pharmaceutical companies? Is there something more stringent or stronger than “best efforts” to meet our agreements?
I agree with my colleague Mr. Kelloway about the number of deaths we've had in Canada. He's right. Obviously I'm a passionate and fiery person, but I don't like to overblow things and say these agreements could have an impact on saving lives, but Mr. Kelloway is right. He nailed it. We are about trying to save lives.
I spoke to some friends of mine in the United Kingdom yesterday. My aunt in Scotland is getting her second dose of vaccine today. I can't help but wonder, if we had been better out of the gate, how many Canadian lives we would have saved if we had had access to vaccines. I know what the Prime Minister said today, but we can't treat this like we're ordering something on Amazon and say, “We've made all kinds of orders. We have a bunch of orders from all these different vaccine companies. We have these contracts.” The question is, do we actually have the vaccine? That's what we don't have.
I get that we have the largest portfolio in the world in what we've ordered. That's great, but how many vaccines do we actually have? That is the biggest disappointment, the biggest failure we're facing right now. We don't have those vaccines. I get it that they may be coming, but to reassure and reassure....
As I say that about reassurance, I'm going to read a quote from my colleague Mr. Powlowski, which came up in some of the documents that were found. I know you are laughing, Marcus, but I just have to call you out a little bit on this one:
I, and I think a lot of people, would have more faith in our ability to do this quickly, and effectively, if we know there is a transparent process as to how we are doing things. As I have said it is hard now to accept reassurances that we are prepared, that we are doing all of the right things, when we can never, ever, get any specifics as to what we are doing and how we are going to do it. Compare what we hear about the health response to what we get in terms of the economic response on things like EI, taxes, student loans, business assistance. There we get specifics not just “we assure all Canadians that we are doing the things necessary....”
That's right. I couldn't agree with you more, Mr. Powlowski. Assurances aren't enough, and even the Liberal members of Parliament wonder why, if our agreements are so good, we are dipping into COVAX to get vaccines.
I know we're going to get the spin that this was part of the agreement and that this is normal. It's embarrassing. It has tarnished our reputation on the global stage—there is no question about it. You cannot spin that. The fact that a G7 country is dipping into COVAX for vaccines that were meant for developing and poorer countries and we are taking those for Canada.... I'm sorry, but as a Canadian citizen, as a proud Canadian, I say that is embarrassing, and there is no question that it has tarnished our reputation on the global stage.
I want to know what is in those contracts. I want to make sure that we are saving Canadian lives and that we don't leave this to reassurances from the government. I think Canadian taxpayers have a right to know how their tax dollars are being spent. We are spending tens of millions, of billions.... Well, now we're getting close to a trillion dollars on this COVID pandemic, and I think the vaccines are an integral part of that. Canadian taxpayers have the right to know what agreements were signed on their behalf.
Saying that we're going to antagonize these pharmaceutical companies and jeopardize deliveries I think is extremely short-sighted, and a horrifically poor argument for patting the Canadian taxpayer on the head and saying: “You know what? You don't need to know this. It's too important for you to know about this. Just sit back and take the assurances of the Prime Minister.” That's what we've been doing. I'm sorry, but it's just not good enough.
Mr. Kelloway, you talked about the syringes. I spoke to the Alberta Minister of Health this week, and the Saskatchewan Minister of Health was at committee. They are getting less than 50% of those six doses out of the vaccine vials, even with the label change. As for what we are asking of Canadians, we don't know when the vaccines are going to be here, but for the vaccines that we do have, we're asking them to portion that out, to do everything they possibly can, but at the best of times, in Alberta and Saskatchewan, they're getting 50%. They're getting that sixth dose out of that vial 50% of the time. Not being able to tell them what's going to happen, how do we ask provinces to ration the vaccines they have? This is just getting worse and worse.
I'm not trying to make this a partisan issue, but, no offence, the Liberals are in government. The Liberals have to wear this.
This is your strategy, for lack of a better term, but I would argue that there isn't a vaccine strategy whatsoever.